POULSBO — Your recyclables are already picked up by a private waste management firm. At a March 30 workshop, Poulsbo City Council members reviewed a proposed request for proposals from private waste management firms to collect the rest of your garbage, too.

The request for proposals, or RFP, had been prepared by city engineering, public works and finance staff, and reviewed by the Kitsap County Solid Waste Division and the city attorney.

Spurring the proposed change: the increasing demands of a growing population.

“Twenty-three years ago, we had three and one-half people doing trash collection,” said Mike Lund, city public works superintendent. “Today, we have two times the population, but we still have three and one-half people doing trash collection.”

Lund said the city would need to add staff if it continues to do trash collection. In addition, two garbage trucks are about worn out and he has spent $50,000 in parts for the trucks since September. New trucks would cost about $400,000 each to replace, he said.

Keeping waste management in-house would also create a space problem as the new public works shop cannot afford space for solid waste equipment. This would mean finding a different location and doing any  necessary preparations.

Few or no jobs would be lost if the city went with a private waste management firm, Lund said. Most of the employees would shift to existing vacancies on the public works staff.

“Providing the best possible service at the lowest price to our citizens has to be our goal,” Mayor Becky Erickson said. “Poulsbo is the only municipality in the area that still handles its own waste management.”

According to her, waste management is one area where the city exercises some control over costs and may be able to find some savings. The costs of other Poulsbo utilities are largely determined by the power company or the county.

Even so, the city has a contract that requires it dispose of its solid waste in Bremerton “forever,” Lund said.

If the city decides to go with a private firm, that company would have to agree to pay all tipping fees at Bremerton. In addition, bidders would agree to hold rate increases to 5 percent a year or less, unless there were “unanticipated extraordinary costs approved by the City.” The firm would also pay an as-yet undetermined franchise fee based on gross receipts, street impact fees for wear and tear, and a utility tax.

The RFP specifically states that a “utility tax shall be collected but not shown as a pass through to the customer.”

“This is a tax on the firm, not the customer,” Erickson said. However, the firm may or may not choose to pass that cost on to the customer. The utility tax is necessary to replace the loss of the utility tax the city charges customers now. The utility tax goes to help fund the general operations of city government.

The City Council asked the staff to revise the RFP to ask for three different options from bidders. The first option would provide all of the services the city provides today, such as picking up Christmas trees, and maintaining the current wide range of different-sized trash cans. The second would be a bid for the standard package they would recommend for a city like Poulsbo. The third option was an a la carte bid that would allow the city to pick and choose the services it wanted to purchase.

The schedule calls for the city to issue proposal documents on June 13. Proposals are due Aug. 9. A panel made up of City Council members, staff and residents are to evaluate the proposals on Sept. 28 and make recommendations to the council at its Oct. 19 meeting. If the decision is to privatize, a public hearing would be scheduled for Nov. 2 and the council would choose a provider at its Nov. 30 meeting. Contract negotiations are expected to take six months so, if the council decides to privatize waste management, the target date for a successful bidder to start collection services would be June 1, 2017.

Falls on 4th Street
Six residents asked on April 6 that a sidewalk on 4th Avenue be completed, after an older woman fell and was seriously injured there. The undeveloped area only has a dirt foot path alongside the street.

While sympathetic, Erickson said the city could not afford to put in a sidewalk. “Developers put in sidewalks. That’s the Poulsbo way,” she said in remarks after the meeting. But, she said the city would look into it and possibly could put in a packed gravel path.

City devotes half of 2015 surplus to improving city streets
Thanks to several one-time tax settlements, the city started the year with a surplus of $621,210. Council members voted April 6 to put about half of those funds into the reserves and half into street improvements. Some $18,000 will also be used to fund several small projects the council had approved but not funded in this year’s budget.

If revenues stay up, the mayor called for a possible tax decrease next year.

$1 a month
The City Council voted to pay Spectrum $1 a month for the use of the licensed radio frequencies needed for the new radio-read water meters that the company is installing.

Written minutes only?
The City Council’s Finance/Accounting Committee is preparing to recommend that City Council committees maintain only written minutes and forego any audio or video recordings. At present, there is no standard procedure for recording committees’ minutes, said committee chairman Ken Thomas. Using only written minutes would meet the legal requirements and save money, he said.